SLAYER Guitarist Says New Bands ‘Have A Huge Sense Of Entitlement’

January 28, 2013

Monster conducted an interview with SLAYER guitarist Kerry King at this year’s NAMM (National Association Of Music Merchants) show, a massive music-products convention that is taking place at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California. You can now watch the chat below.

Asked if there was ever a moment when he first felt that his band had “made it,” King said: “Probably the first time we got a tour bus. One thing that I notice a lot… I can’t say all the new bands, but a lot of the younger generation, they seem to expect things. They expect to go on tour and have the tour bus that their heroes have. When we came up, we had a Camaro and a U-Haul. And then when we got ‘big,’ we had a van and a u-Haul. So when you got the tour bus, it was, like, ‘Alright, something’s gotta be working,’ you know. But I never expected it. It was just, like, ‘Alright, if we deserve it, when our time comes, fuck yeah, we got a tour bus. That’s awesome.’ And then you get a different perspective. But people…. I see it a lot at these NAMM shows, people come in and present themselves like, ‘Don’t you wanna give me some?’ without being anybody, without earning shit. And it wasn’t like that when I grew up … I think they have a huge sense of entitlement.”

Regarding what keeps him going more than 30 years since SLAYER‘s inception, King said: “Shows are awesome; I love shows. And you know, when you make up new stuff, you’re in quest of the perfect riff. I don’t know if it’s been written yet, and I may never know, but you’re always making up new stuff and re-impressing yourself and re-energizing yourself, making up things that are, for myself, so SLAYER. And it’s, like, ‘How did we never write this before?’ And that’s fun.”

King, Chilean-born bassist/vocalist Tom Araya and drummer Dave Lombardo are continuing to play shows with EXODUS guitarist Gary Holt, who has been filling in for SLAYER guitarist Jeff Hanneman for two years while Jeff recovers from contracting necrotizing fasciitis, likely caused by a spider bite.

SLAYER last year entered the studio to record two new songs with producer Greg Fidelman for a possible EP release.

In a summer 2012 interview with “Metal Zone” host Nikki Blakk of the San Francisco, California radio station 107.7 The Bone, King was asked whether Hanneman is contributing to the songwriting process for the new album. “On the last record [2009’s ‘World Painted Blood’], it was kind of, like, [split] down the middle [between me and Jeff]. On the records prior, it was mostly me. This one’s been all me so far,” he said. “He’s welcome to contribute. It’s just a matter of him [putting] something [together] and getting it to us.”

New Jersey thrash metal veterans OVERKILL are working on their new studio album for a March 2014 release.

In a recent interview with Radiosuicide Photography’s RSPTV,OVERKILL vocalist Bobby “Blitz” Ellsworth stated about the band’s plans for the coming months: “There’s six songs done [for the next record so far]. What we’re gonna do in the interim is we’re gonna come over while recording and do European festivals. After that, we do a U.S. tour with the German band called KREATOR. It’s gonna be a flip-flop headline; we’ll close the shows on the East Coast in those theaters and they’ll close on the West Coast in theaters, or big clubs. After that, we drop the record in March, it hits the street. They even gave me the date as March 7 already, so we’re that far planned ahead for those type of activities. And after that, I’m sure that what we’re gonna do is just start rolling these tours again. And I think that as we’ve gotten older, one of the things that we like is that we actually do more tours, but we do less touring; we’re not away from home for three months or sixty days, we’re away from home for three or four weeks. Three weeks is a great tour for a guy my age. Because then you don’t have to recover for a month when you come home. [laughs]”